Pater Meus
by TheChronicler137
Summary: A one-shot about Zhalia and Klaus. Takes place during and after S2E06, The Blood Spiral. Tie-in with No Rest for the Wicked.


Dimitte Me Debita Meus

**A/N I realise most of the stories here demonise Klaus and show him as an evil and abusive 'father' figure in relation to Zhalia. So, in light of Zhalia's vision in Chapter 5 of _No Rest for the Wicked_, I decided to correct that.**

** Also, I'm pretty sure that Zhalia and Klaus wouldn't have just left it at that after she de-petrified him.**

** Anyway, enjoy.**

"Get him on his feet," Zhalia ordered, as she walked into the room.

_Zhalia sat on the sidewalk, sobbing in sorrow. Already she had felt too much pain for a girl her age._

_ She suddenly became aware of the presence of a man, and stopped crying._

_ She turned and saw him smiling kindly, a hand extended towards her._

_ She reached out, and he clasped her hand, firmly and warmly._

_ And he walked her away from the hell on the street._

She stared into his lifeless, stony eyes.

"Let's get this over with," she said, unsure if her resentment was directed at Klaus for shaping her into an unquestioning minion of the Organisation, or at herself, for betraying the only father she had ever known.

"Zhalia turned Klaus to stone with King Basilisk's power during our last battle," Dante said.

"That means I'm the one who has to do this," she said bitterly.

Dante nodded, "Mm-hmm."

"Here goes nothing…put them in their place! KING BASILISK!"

"Release Klaus!" she ordered, her resolve more due to the fact that they needed to free their informant than that she wanted to free her father.

Waves or purple energy washed over the petrified Klaus, and cracks started spreading over him. Pieces of rock began falling off.

Klaus groaned as he struggled to break free from the prison of stone, the fragments of which disintegrated into nothingness as they fell to the ground.

The man fell back into his seat, and inhaled deeply.

He looked straight into Zhalia's eyes.

"Zhalia!?"

He looked around.

"Foundation HQ?"

"Zhalia…what are we doing here?"

"I'm…I'm with the Huntik Foundation," she tried her best to meet his gaze.

"It's for real this time," she shut her eyes, exhausted from the effort.

"And she's one of our best Seekers," Dante said.

"I'm out of it for a little while, and everyone gets delusions of grandeur!"

Klaus seemed to take the news of Zhalia's defection remarkably lightly.

"Klaus, we've come for your help," Sophie said.

"We need to find the amulet of the Titan Void."

"Time's running out," Lok added.

"If we don't find Void soon, this thing called the Spiral Mark is going to open."

"I'm sure you've come across the legends," Dante said.

"When the Mark opens, it's all over," Sophie said.

"Yes, yes," he nodded. "No-one would be spared! Rich men, poor men, friends, strangers, even fathers…and daughters!"

Zhalia had, up till this point, kept her eyes shut, incapable of looking into those of the man who had been a father to her.

"I will help," he said, resolutely.

* * *

"_My home is burning…right now_."

There was a knock on Zhalia's door as she stared out the window.

She breathed deeply, instinctively knowing it was Klaus.

"Come in…Uncle Klaus."

He entered, and gently closed the door behind him.

"Zhalia, my dear," he said softly, and with no hint of irony or sarcasm.

A tear started rolling down her cheek, as Klaus laid a hand on her shoulder.

"I'm sorry," he said, voice wavering.

She knew he was tearing up too.

"For what, Uncle Klaus?" she asked, herself unsure if she was using the name with sarcasm.

"Zhalia, please," Klaus begged. Apparently he thought she was.

"It wasn't always like this," he said quietly.

"When I found you, I was just a Seeker with a bookshop, who wanted to learn more about Titans. A scientist, you could say. A researcher, who only wanted knowledge, _truth_! That was all."

"It was only a short time before the Professor found me, and offered me assistance in my quest for truth: money, and assistants, and guinea pigs! He had but one condition: that I share the fruit of my quest with him. I'm sorry, Zhalia. I knew that he wouldn't use Araknos because that might damage my ability to continue researching, and also make it impossible for me to train you, one of the most talented Seekers either of us had ever met."

She slowly turned around, to see him gazing at her through teary eyes with a mixture of approval and pride, a bittersweet smile on his lips.

"I have no doubt, Zhalia, that you are one of the very best Seekers in the Foundation. I trained you well, my dear."

He returned to the main narrative.

"Nonetheless, I agreed to serve him anyway. His offer was too ludicrous to resist! I was reluctant at first, but I slowly came to accept it. I had no idea what it was he truly wished to do, however, until the Foundation told me just now."

"I love you, Zhalia, my dear, but I wanted so badly to succeed in my quest for truth that I…I didn't consider about how it would affect us. Before long, all I knew was that unless I followed the Professor's orders unquestioningly, he'd do much worse than cut me off from the Organisation. I was too hasty, Zhalia, and the Professor trapped us in the Organisation. I thought I could get you a better life, that I could finally unravel the mysteries of the Titans, but in the end all my efforts only helped a megalomaniac try to gain immortality and take over the world! And we suffered for it. So for that, Zhalia, I am very sorry…my daughter."

Zhalia couldn't believe that _Klaus_ was crying tears of regret, sorrow and love in front of her. _To_ her. And after all she had done to him.

"I…I'm sorry too, Uncle Klaus," she burst out, the tide of emotions within her swelling and overflowing (a very rare moment).

"I'm sorry for everything I did to hurt you."

Her sincerity this time, in using the moniker, was clearly evident to both.

"You…because of you, I had become a slave to the Professor. I had to fight the person I cared about most in the world. So I suppose…I suppose I forgot how you loved me with a father's love…"

There was a pause, as tears streamed down the faces of both.

"…and how you still do."

"Oh, my dear Zhalia," Klaus hugged her, as much to comfort her as to comfort himself.

And Zhalia hugged him back, the tears of each flowing into the clothes of the other.

After a long, comforting embrace, they separated.

"Do you…do you remember that photo of us that I always keep next to my bed?"

"Yes, yes…we were so _happy_ then, my dear! That was before that wretched Professor and his mad dreams of domination!" he gnashed his teeth.

"I'm sorry, Uncle Klaus, but…when I saw it…I said I didn't need it."

Klaus, despite trying, in light of her earlier explanation, to understand this course of action, still looked deeply hurt, and fresh tears came to his eyes.

"But maybe I really don't, now that I have you here, to love me like how you did before…my father."

His tears of pain turned to tears of joy, as they embraced once more, both rejoicing in the knowledge that the trespasses of each against the other had been forgiven.

**A/N Klaus would later become a researcher for the Huntik Foundation, having as much to teach them as they had to teach him. He would bear a grudge against the Blood Spirals for burning down his bookshop for a long time to come.**

** Just something I noticed: Klaus, for some reason, sounds a lot like Dr. Doofenshmirtz from _Phineas and Ferb_.**


End file.
